Portable devices are used by a variety of people. Several types of devices exist including mobile phones, smart phones, tablets and pagers. Different types of portable devices are typically intended to be used for different purposes or in different environments. Some of these purposes include for personal use and for use in a particular working environment. When in a working environment, such as a healthcare environment, a user may be required to use his or her hands in a continual manner and therefore may not be able to pick up and check the device regularly. If work related information or instructions are being relayed to the user via a portable device, then the user may need to check the device for the instructions. Sometimes these instructions may be time critical and require the user to review them immediately. This may pose a problem if the user is trying to view these instructions from a smart phone display which the user carries in their pocket because the user may be using both hands to carry out a work task that cannot be interrupted. Also, the user may be working in an environment where the spread of infection should be minimised. Continually picking up and looking at a device for instructions may increase the spread of infection. Some working environments have multiple people working within them wherein each person may need to be given separate and different instructions. These environments may also require different people to work on different shifts. Some current workplace solutions may address this by each person having their own portable device, such as a smart phone or a pager. It may be costly to provide each worker with their own separate device to receive information on, particularly if the workforce is a large one. US2013/0344812 A1 describes a method for enabling a wireless communication between at least one peripheral unit (referenced as Bluetooth slaves ‘al-aN’) and a wireless device (referenced as ‘100’) by using a docking station (refereed as ‘10’). The docking station and the peripheral units al-aN form at least part of a wireless docking environment for the wireless device. The Bluetooth slaves al-aN are paired with a main Bluetooth master of the docking station. The main Bluetooth master of the docking station 10 thereby contains the Bluetooth slaves pairing information. When the device enters the wireless docking environment and happens to be in reach and listening, it starts communicating with the docking station, using a second communication type such as Wi-Fi. The pairing of the wireless device to the docking station produces a “successful docking” event and the wireless device 100 becomes a docked device. Once the Wi-Fi connection is established, the docking station is able to send the Bluetooth pairing information to the docked wireless device. The Bluetooth pairing information contains the data suitable for communicating with the Bluetooth slaves al-aN. US2013/0344812 A1 does not describe the coupling of the device to a power supply.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,249,212B2 describes a method and system for wirelessly coupling a computer with a peripheral device. The peripheral device is initially docked to a docking port in the computer. Detecting the docking event, the computer then turns on the docked peripheral device and listens for identifiers from all peripheral devices within range of the computer, including the identifier for the peripheral device that is presently docked with the computer. The computer then instructs the docked peripheral device to ‘turn off’, thus preventing the docked peripheral device from broadcasting its identifier. By a process of deduction, the computer is able to identify the docked peripheral device.